From the above statistics: Analysis 1 - Chile, Guyana, Japan and Nicaragua
First, the school enrollment rate of female in Chile, Guyana, Japan and Nicaragua are quite similar to boys, and their literacy rates between male and female are almost the same too. However, among the four countries, women cannot achieve the gender equality. Therefore, there must be some other reasons affecting the gender inequality.
In Chile, the retrograde country of the gender equality in Latin America, women cannot enjoy the gender equality. First, some of the Chileans believe that the power of a society should be held by male (Sarah Menkedick, 2010)[1] because they think that men have more abilites than women. Taking a look in the situation of working, it is easy to understand that people with more abilities will earn more in the job. But in Chile, there are the different wages between women and men even if they have the same education level. Male always have a higher salaries compared with the female. And the gap of salaries between them are wider when their education level is higher. As a result, the problem of gender inequality is more serious (Sarah Menkedick, 2010). In addition, people in Chile prefer women to stay at home rather than working as the tradition values are deeply-rooted in people’s mind (Sarah Menkedick, 2010). In Chile, women and men have the internal and the external roles respectively. Women are responsible for looking after the whole family while men are responsible for working outside.
In Guyana, past government regulations and traditional culture are the reasons that impact on gender equality. For past government regulations, government all have impacted negatively on equality for Guyanese women at the workplace. For instance, when women and men have the same qualification, women are not permitted to enter service as a clerk. Furthermore, Guyana is not a rich country, and Government divided more resources and opportunities for male rather than females. For traditional culture, it constrained the types of work which appropriate for women. Guyanese women are usually engaged in-home production, dress making, raising poultry and other activities, which is an important contribution on household income. Moreover, Islam is one of the religious in Guyana, and Islam decreed that women should not work or attend school outside the home. (Janet Saltzman Chafetz)[2] Therefore, prejudice and certain cultural practices in Guyana impede women’s careers and their rising to leadership positions.
In Japan, nevertheless, the education level of Japanese women are increasing, and they are trying their efforts to change the women’s role and achieve the gender equality but it seems that the problem cannot be addressed well. As in their society, there are the high-colored sense of the patriarchy in people's mind. The role of men and women are fully separated. That means the duty of men is working and the duty of women is just like servants to manage the household affair (Tradition & Change, 2000). Along with this phenomenon, female workers are not respected by the employers in Japan. The employers consider that women will not work permanently because once they get married, the employers will expect that those women will leave the job, give birth and take the responsibility of the family rather than work in the company (Tradition & Change, 2000).
In recent years the revolution of school enrollment between boys and girls starts to swell. Girls are more likely to access the education in all the education level than boys since boys drop out of school to find a job for supporting their families (José Adán Silva, 2011)[3] . However, Karla Mendoza, a 26-year-old Nicaraguan with high education level complained that even though you have been well-educated, it does not mean that you can get a job easily in our society because how much you studied is not important if you are women here (José Adán Silva, 2011). From the above extract is can be seen that the status of women in Nicaragua is insignificant. Employers in Nicaragua have a concept of women laborers being weaker, less competent and hence condemn them. Male laborers on the other hand are widely employed due to the fact that they are the ‘stronger’ sex in the society. The occurrence of this social phenomenon whereby, physically able men are preferred to educated women is strongly link to the country’s economy structure. The root of the country’s economy is agriculture and it is also heavily dependent on sectors which require blue collared workers instead of the ‘white collared’. Hence due to the various factors, the duties of Women in Nicaragua will be lowly housekeepers tasked with carrying water, collecting fuel wood, caring for children, producing agriculture, and working in the market for their families.
Second, the school enrollment rate of female in Benin and India are low, and their literacy rates of female are lower than male. Therefore, we concluded that women’s education is the direct factor affecting the gender inequality.
In Benin, women's education is the key to gender inequality as there are insufficient skills, confidences and information for uneducated women to fight for their own rights in a society (Geeta Sharma). We can observe the above statistics, compared to boys, the chances for girls to enter the school are different (Gender sensitive in society). This trend undoubtedly brings out the gender inequality as a girl without any basic knowledge can only act as a passive role in a society. That means they cannot strive for everything in the society. Even in the school, different issues facing to girls can be the result of gender inequality. Girls cannot possess a fair treat compared to boys as there are more male teachers than female in school; the different knowledge gained by boys and girls in school, that is fewer girls study the male’s mainstream subject such as science and mathematics which are useful for entering the formal market; and long school hours which is not suitable for girls to enter school as girls prefer to do housework (Gender equality in education in Benin, 2003).
In India, the lack of the women’s education impacts the gender inequality. And the reasons are quite similar to the case of Benin. However, in this part of analysis, we focus on the factors leading to the lack of women's education. In the individual aspect, people in India considered that all female are independent in their whole life: young girls rely on their father, married female rely on their husband and the old women rely on their son (Gender inequality in India). In the family aspect, the role of female mainly focused on the housework and agricultural matters, such as grazing the cattle and collecting firewood (Gender inequality in India). In the economic aspect, poverty is one of the reasons to affect the women’s education, as the income of the whole family cannot support the tuition fee and other expense for a girl to go to school (Geeta Sharma). Just in case, when a family has many children, they will prefer to send the boys to school instead of girls (Geeta Sharma). With the above three factors, it showed that females in India are not necessary to go to school.
Analysis 3 - Djibouti
Finally, there is a special case in our research. In Djibouti, the school enrollment rate of girls is higher than boys. Surprisingly, the literacy rate of male is higher than female. What are the factors that are causing this contradiction? What are the main reasons for the gender inequality in Djibouti? In Djibouti, womenare not encouraged to go to school. Therefore, present female population is more fortunate as they can go to primary school after the government promoted the girls’ right to education. In the case that any female wishes to enhance their skills, she can join the handicraft group, literacy classes, computer training, etc (Lynellyn Long, 2004)[5] . Normally they will work hard to have further studies because once they failed the benchmark to enter the secondary schools; their education path will just fall through altogether. Although schooling is not limited for children, only boys have the second chance to continue their study by joining the foreign legion (Amel Mili, 2009)[6] . Furthermore, the literacy rate is compelled via the rates in both urban and rural areas. However, the gap between urban and rural areas is very wide. The ratio of female to male is about 0.77 in urban areas compared to the ratio of 0.50 in rural areas. (World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group, 2009) This is because in rural areas, schools are utilized for boys only. (Amel Mili, 2009)[7] And, women only constituted 40% of the students at the University of Djibouti. (World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group, 2009)[8] Therefore, the overall literacy rate of male is higher than female. Djibouti’s economy relies on the male. Women are constrained from going to school or work because of their domestic and childcare responsibilities. The socio-cultural attitudes and beliefs about gender roles is keeping more girls at home to look after their children, do housework, fetch water, etc. In addition, many women are forced to drop out of school due to pregnancy and as a result, there is a poor sexual contraception. (Lynellyn Long, 2004: 34)[9]Although some girls’ academic results are better than the boys’, families in Djibouti still let boys go to school because of the traditions. As we said before, only boys can have the second chance to continue their study and only boys can study at school in rural areas. It indicated the sereneness of gender inequality in Djibouti. That is why the women education is low in Djibouti. Also, most working women in Djibouti are either self-employed (27.8%) or work in the informal sector (31.7%) because of their high illiterate rate, (40%) and the low educational level. The unemployment rate of female is 66.3% which is higher than male. The unemployment rate of married women is 60.1% while the rate of married men is 33.7%. (World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group, 2007: 80)[10] From the above situation, we can find that although the gender equality is improved, gender equality in Djibouti is still low.
Conclusion In sum, there are two conclusions we can draw:
The same education level between men and women is not necessary to impact the gender equality as there are other factors affecting the gender equality.
Women’s low education level is one of the factors affecting the gender equality. At the same time, there are lots of factors affecting the education level of women. Therefore, to answer our research question, we would say: there is a causal relation between women education and gender equality.
^ Lynellyn Long (2004) ‘Situation Analysis of Basic Education in Djibouti: Increasing Community Involvement (PTAs), Girls’ Enrolments, and Non Formal Educational Opportunities
^ Amel Mili (2009) ‘Exploring the Relation between Gender Politics and Representative Government in the Maghreb: Analytical and Empirical Observations’
^ Amel Mili (2009) ‘Exploring the Relation between Gender Politics and Representative Government in the Maghreb: Analytical and Empirical Observations’
^ The Status & Progress of Women in the Middle East & North Africa (2009), ‘World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group’
^ Lynellyn Long (2004) ‘Situation Analysis of Basic Education in Djibouti: Increasing Community Involvement (PTAs), Girls’ Enrolments, and Non Formal Educational Opportunities
^ The Status & Progress of Women in the Middle East & North Africa (2007) ‘World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group’
From the above statistics:
Analysis 1 - Chile, Guyana, Japan and Nicaragua
First, the school enrollment rate of female in Chile, Guyana, Japan and Nicaragua are quite similar to boys, and their literacy rates between male and female are almost the same too. However, among the four countries, women cannot achieve the gender equality. Therefore, there must be some other reasons affecting the gender inequality.
In Chile, the retrograde country of the gender equality in Latin America, women cannot enjoy the
In Guyana, past government regulations and traditional culture are the reasons that impact on gender equality. For past government regulations, government all have impacted negatively on equality for Guyanese women at the workplace. For instance, when women and men have the same qualification, women are not permitted to enter service as a clerk. Furthermore, Guyana is not a rich country, and Government divided more resources and opportunities for male rather than females. For traditional culture, it constrained the types of work which appropriate for women. Guyanese women are usually engaged in-home production, dress making, raising poultry and other activities, which is an important contribution on household income. Moreover, Islam is one of the religious in Guyana, and Islam decreed that women should not work or attend school outside the home. (Janet Saltzman Chafetz)[2] Therefore, prejudice and certain cultural practices in Guyana impede women’s careers and their rising to leadership positions.
(FSD website) [4]
Analysis 2 - Benin and India
Second, the school enrollment rate of female in Benin and India are low, and their literacy rates of female are lower than male. Therefore, we concluded that women’s education is the direct factor affecting the gender inequality.
In Benin, women's education is the key to gender inequality as there are insufficient skills,
In India, the lack of the women’s education impacts the gender inequality. And the reasons are quite similar to the case of Benin. However, in this part of analysis, we focus on the factors leading to the lack of women's education. In the individual aspect, people in India considered that all female are independent in their whole life: young girls rely on their father, married female rely on their husband and the old women rely on their son (Gender inequality in India). In the family aspect, the role of female mainly focused on the housework and agricultural matters, such as grazing the cattle and collecting firewood (Gender inequality in India). In the economic aspect, poverty is one of the reasons to affect the women’s education, as the income of the whole family cannot support the tuition fee and other expense for a girl to go to school (Geeta Sharma). Just in case, when a family has many children, they will prefer to send the boys to school instead of girls (Geeta Sharma). With the above three factors, it showed that females in India are not necessary to go to school.
Analysis 3 - Djibouti
Finally, there is a special case in our research. In Djibouti, the school enrollment rate of girls is higher than boys. Surprisingly, the literacy rate of male is higher than female. What are the factors that are causing this contradiction? What are the main reasons for the gender inequality in Djibouti?
In Djibouti, womenare not encouraged to go to school. Therefore, present female population is more fortunate as they can go to primary school after the government promoted the girls’ right to education. In the case that any female wishes to enhance their skills, she can join the handicraft group, literacy classes, computer training, etc (Lynellyn Long, 2004)[5] . Normally they will work hard to have further studies because once they failed the benchmark to
Djibouti’s economy relies on the male. Women are constrained from going to school or work because of their domestic and childcare responsibilities. The socio-cultural attitudes and beliefs about gender roles is keeping more girls at home to look after their children, do housework, fetch water, etc. In addition, many women are forced to drop out of school due to pregnancy and as a result, there is a poor sexual contraception. (Lynellyn Long, 2004: 34)[9] Although some girls’ academic results are better than the boys’, families in Djibouti still let boys go to school because of the traditions. As we said before, only boys can have the second chance to continue their study and only boys can study at school in rural areas. It indicated the sereneness of gender inequality in Djibouti. That is why the women education is low in Djibouti. Also, most working women in Djibouti are either self-employed (27.8%) or work in the informal sector (31.7%) because of their high illiterate rate, (40%) and the low educational level. The unemployment rate of female is 66.3% which is higher than male. The unemployment rate of married women is 60.1% while the rate of married men is 33.7%. (World Bank Middle East and North Africa Social and Economic Development Group, 2007: 80)[10] From the above situation, we can find that although the gender equality is improved, gender equality in Djibouti is still low.
Conclusion
In sum, there are two conclusions we can draw:
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Available: http://news.change.org/stories/machismo-in-chile-serious-barrier-to-gender-equality( 16 October, 2011)
Available: http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=54342 [03 February 2011]